


an inner kindness

by orphan_account



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Anger, Anxiety, Anxiety Disorder, Comfort, Established Relationship, M/M, Mental Illness, heavy introspection, most of this is introspection, mostly textual dialogue
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-17
Updated: 2018-10-17
Packaged: 2019-08-03 13:13:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 548
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16326917
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Yuuri helps his friend one way he knows how.





	an inner kindness

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading.

_ You are not your anger. _

 

Perfunctorily, Yuuri checks his text, enlarging the screen with the tips of his fingers. Calling would be so much easier, but Yurio’s probably in the middle of practicing.

 

_ If you think I’ve never felt how you’re feeling right now, you’re wrong. It’s so easy to finally give up, welcome the pain, submit yourself to the voice in your head saying all the awful truths. You know what helps me out, though? I hear my own voice through the worn-out radio, saying, “That’s not you. That’s your anxiety.” _

 

_ And it’s part of us. Knowing that doesn’t mean it’s us. That voice saying otherwise, that’s us. Don’t forget to listen. If you’re already hearing it, you’re doing so much better. _

 

“All right?”

 

Shaking, Yuuri pockets his phone in his dark leggings before holding Viktor close around his dove white shoulders. 

 

“Startled me,” he says, muffling the words into Viktor’s chest.

 

“Work in progress.” Sliding Yuuri’s chin into his palm, Viktor kisses his open mouth before saying, “I’m outside when you’re ready.”

 

“Okay.”

 

They stay firmly encased in one another for a meandering length of time before Viktor kisses the hair fallen in a disorderly clump on Yuuri’s forehead and goes out to wait by their car.

 

Yuuri remembers sharing warm mugs of cocoa with Phichit over a crackling fire at the inn, talking to him in hushed reverence about how loving someone whose life involves little else but you changes how you think: about yourself, about the family you choose, about the family that raised you. 

 

In some ways, since loving Viktor (though he has for what feels like his whole life, but now in and endless, forever changing way), his anxiety has lessened into a dubious acquaintance that chooses inopportune moments to loiter outside his door with the perverse assurance it cannot go unheard. But it’s also doubled, grown into an organism beyond his understanding, heavy with the knowledge that a dream this long in the fabricating may yet destroy itself with its own power.

 

_ You chose this life, Yuuri. Blame your own dumb heart.  _

 

The terrific cyclone of pain, forever spiraling through his stomach, subsides when he smiles at Viktor’s luminous shadow, etched across the frosted window, glittering in the winter sunlight.

 

Their hearts chose this life because they can’t live with anyone less than the greatest comfort.

 

_ Yurio. Right. _

 

Swallowing, Yuuri curls his fingers around his phone. 

 

_ fuck _

_ have you ever thought of going into the mental health profession _

_ this actually helped me _

 

_ Does he ever think about how far he’s come?  _ Probably not enough, Yuuri decides, considering that response. 

 

He debates with himself over writing about how much his competitor (read: dear friend) has accomplished within the last year: clinching a historic win, finding a best friend who became a boyfriend, now likely family, though he’d never indulge someone of Yuuri’s status in that private happiness.

 

They’re getting there, though.

 

_ otabek says you’re one of the kindest people he knows _

_ you better fucking remember that okay _

 

The rush, then, of the assurance that at the end of the day, someone thinks of a kindness he’s shown before closing their eyes, coaxes Yuuri into the remaining hours of the afternoon.

 

“Thank you,” he says, smiling, and outside, Viktor’s shadow turns towards him. 


End file.
